MEDIA; Journalist, Cover Thyself

By KATHARINE Q. SEELYE

Published: November 21, 2005

Here's something you do not see every day: a newspaper reporter interrogating his own boss -- on live television yet.

Howard Kurtz, the media writer for The Washington Post, posed tough questions yesterday for nearly eight minutes to Leonard Downie Jr., The Post's executive editor, on a program where Mr. Kurtz is host, CNN's ''Reliable Sources.'' The subject was the revelation last week that Bob Woodward, The Post's investigative reporter, had not disclosed the fact that a senior official in the Bush administration leaked the name of a C.I.A. agent to him more than two years ago.

Mr. Kurtz's program then featured a discussion with three panelists, one of whom assailed Mr. Woodward. (Mr. Kurtz had invited him to be on the program, but Mr. Woodward booked himself instead on CNN's ''Larry King Live.'')

You've heard of reality television? This might be reality newspaper. It is ''The Washington Post Live,'' and it is playing out on CNN, thanks in part to Mr. Kurtz and his highly unusual double role as media writer for The Post and media referee for the cable network.

In the last few years, with the rise of blogs and a rich supply of scandals at news organizations, including The New York Times, the media have come under intense scrutiny. And many news outlets have turned a critical eye on themselves -- a tricky matter rife with conflict that raises the question of whether anyone can report fully and fairly on his or her own employer, particularly for public consumption.

Few have lived in the cross-hairs of these conflicts more visibly than Mr. Kurtz, who has owned the media beat at The Post since 1990 and been host of ''Reliable Sources'' since 1998.

He draws salaries from two of the most important media companies in the country: CNN, which is owned by Time Warner, and The Post, which is owned by The Washington Post Company. Such arrangements do not violate Post policy. In fact, The Post has quite liberal rules regarding extracurricular work by its reporters and editors.

As Mr. Downie put it in an online chat last week on the newspaper's Web site, ''We think there is value in having our best journalism reach as many people as possible through our newspaper, this Web site, television and radio appearances and books.''

He may never have imagined that one person might do all those jobs at once. But Mr. Kurtz, 52, does -- redefining the term cottage industry and raising questions about potential conflicts of interest.

''It's very odd to look at,'' said Jack Shafer, media critic for Slate.com. ''This is the duck-billed platypus of journalism, an egg-laying mammal with fur -- it's just something very bizarre.''

Mr. Downie said in an interview that he was comfortable with Mr. Kurtz's dual roles because they were disclosed in a tag line in The Post and on the screen on CNN.

David Bohrman, vice president of CNN and Washington bureau chief, said that Mr. Kurtz was ''as tough as anybody'' on the network, adding that his dual roles at The Post and CNN served as a useful ''check and balance,'' because if he were ''throttled or stifled at one place, he has another platform to get it out.''

Mickey Kaus, who is a blogger on Slate.com and a frequent critic of Mr. Kurtz, says that he has been an honest reporter and is equally tough on The Post and CNN, but that his dual positions create an inherent institutional conflict that exists regardless of how fair he may be and how much he discloses his various roles.

''The conflict is that he works for one of the giant corporations that he covers -- CNN -- and that corporation has made his career,'' Mr. Kaus said. If he makes CNN mad, he said, it could hurt that career. ''Len Downie is in denial about it,'' Mr. Kaus added.

Mr. Kurtz brushes off charges of conflict of interest and says the proof of his independence is evident in his work.

''The biggest conflict I face,'' he said, ''is writing about The Washington Post, which I do periodically and, I think, rather aggressively. I don't think you can find a media writer in the country who has taken on his own organization as many times and on as many difficult issues as I have. And when I write about CNN, which I have also not hesitated to criticize, we disclose that at the paper.''

If Mr. Kurtz is in the lead in the cross-platform era, he is also one of this era's most prolific production machines. His schedule raises the simple human question of how one person (newly remarried with a year-old baby) finds the time and energy to manage them all.

He produces enterprise articles and breaking news for The Post, in addition to his column for the paper every Monday. He answers questions in an hourlong, online chat with Post readers on Mondays. He writes on a blog for The Post every Monday through Friday. On Sunday, he is host of the hourlong ''Reliable Sources.'' He frequently appears as a media expert on CNN and other television channels. He is a guest on radio. He has written four books. And he is now writing a roman ?lef about the news business.

''I'm fooling around at the moment with a satiric novel about the news business and having fun, for once, by not having to check my facts,'' he said in one of a series of interviews last week between his multiple commitments.